


Chance, Not By Chance

by Jenwryn



Category: Death Note
Genre: M/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-12-25
Updated: 2008-12-25
Packaged: 2017-10-02 07:01:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3805
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jenwryn/pseuds/Jenwryn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's a chance meeting in a dark alley, but it's not by chance at all...</p><p>Written as a Christmas present for Tierfal.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Chance, Not By Chance

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Tierfal](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tierfal/gifts).



> The prompt was AFI's 'Prelude 12/21', although it was more that it became the soundtrack to the atmosphere of this story, rather than that I used it in any specific way. XD

_This is what I thought, I thought you'd need me.  
This is what I thought, so think me naive  
I'd promised you a heart, you'd promise to keep.  
Kiss my eyes and lay me to sleep.  
_

~ AFI, Prelude 12/21.

* * *

A chance meeting in a dark alley, not chance at all, but organised by Matt through a man, who knew a man, who knew a man.

Mello has that look on his face that says, _Matt, you moron._

In actual fact, that is exactly what he does say when he gets around to speaking, albeit embellished with a new vocabulary ('what the fuck are you doing here, you bloody dipshit, didn't I make myself clear?') that suited the whored-up leather pants the blond had somehow squeezed his arse into. Not that Matt objects to the language, let alone the pants, but...

"Well?" Mello snaps, and prods Matt sharply in the chest with a dark-gleaming handgun in place of an accusing finger.

"Mello," is Matt's simple response, his own hands reaching out and digging in hard against the shoulders of the boy - the man, now - standing angrily before him. He snares his fingers on Mello's coat, the fur slipping beneath his grasp as he stares in what he hopes is an entreating way. His intellect tells him that now is the time to say silent, even though what he really wants to do is chant _Mihael, Mihael, Mihael I found you..._ His intellect has always been sharper than his heart and, right now, he follows the one over the other, especially since he's seen that wicked glint in Mello's eyes before, back when they were children, and the blond had felt his will were crossed, only this time it's been magnified a dozen times over, and there's a gun involved.

A chance meeting in a dark alley, that wasn't chance at all, and Mello still hasn't moved his gun, and the barrel of the Baretta is pressing hard enough that it will probably leave a bruise. He leaves it there, resting his weight against it, but then raises his other hand and pushes at Matt's goggles, Matt's stupid stupid goggles, pushing them up his forehead and onto his hair, catching and tugging at red as he yanks mercilessly upwards. Matt doesn't move, just gazes at him, and then lets his eyes fall shut, just for a second, as Mello runs the back of his thumb down along the side of Matt's face.

"You fucking idiot," Mello mutters, voice staggering over the vowels. "Don't you know I left you for a reason?"

Matt licks at the corner of his mouth, flicking dampness towards the scent of Mello's chocolate-smudged fingers where they've come to rest at his jaw. His own hands dig even tighter against Mello's shoulders, pressing as hard as he can because he wants Mello to feel it; because he wants to leave marks, wants to leave marks all over the blond's body beneath that armour of leather and fur and anger, but shoulders alone will have to do for now. "I told you I'd follow you," he hisses, back pressed painfully, but willingly, against the pipes Mello has shoved him onto. Matt's tough enough himself and, though he can feel the new-found strength of Mello's arms, and his annoyance, he knows he could shove the blond away if he chose to. But he also knows that this is something Mello thinks he needs, so he resigns himself to the way the pipe connectors and clamps nick at his vertebrae beneath his own jacket. For now, anyway.

"And I told you fucking not to," counters Mello.

Mello's mouth is still angry but his eyes are softening, and Matt lets his hands slide off of Mello's shoulders and down his arms, blithely ignoring the gun still pressed to his chest. Mello flinches beneath his touch before leaning into it, as though he doesn't want to, but cannot help himself. One, two, three, counting in his mind, and then Matt moves without warning, pulls Mello in hard against him, dragging him in so close that the gun's barrel will be turning his skin off-purple as they speak. He doesn't care, just presses, and drags, and breathes, and hisses, "I gave my word, Mihael."

He'd given more than his word, that day, that day when the blond had gone and left him on his own. He'd given him his soul, bound up and tied with a silver ribbon, his soul, and his heart. And the teenage version of the bitter man standing here before him had broken down and accepted it, because it was what he'd needed himself, because it was what he'd wanted himself; had let Matt kiss away his tears, had let Matt smooth away the anger and transform it into cool determination, had let him, let him, let him do that which Matt had always dreamt of doing, let him take Mello into his arms, and taste his skin, and drag their bodies together on the blond's unmade bed, his bed that would stay unmade for a week afterwards, and Matt muttering-crying-raging himself to sleep in it, until the scent of sex and chocolate and Mello had worn away, and left only Matt...

And now Mello's body trembles, and he shoves the gun in the band of his trousers, raises both of his hands, and touches at Matt's face as if he's only just seen him standing there for the very first time, as if he's a blind man desperately making out a countenance by piecing together the feel of bone and skin and surprisingly soft lashes.

"I gave my word," Matt repeats. And then, barely audible, "I love you." He's never said it before, and he doesn't intend on saying it again, unless it's something Mello needs to hear it, but he does say it now, for his own reasons, because intellect and heart are united for once in their scream that it must be said. Must be said, and out with it. He needs Mello to understand; aches for understanding.

The man in leather shuts his eyes and looks pained, looks relieved, looks scared, looks astounded. "I knew," he manages. "I don't know."

Mello's words fumble upon themselves, and he cannot bring himself to make sense, cannot bring himself to offer up the traditional response, because it would cut his soul too bare, and he doesn't have the strength for that. Not on his own.

A chance meeting in a dark alley, not by chance at all and Matt turns, and presses Mello hard against the pipes in his place, and traces lips along his new scars and his old, and unzips Mello's impossibly tarty vest so that he can slide his hands in beneath the clothes and stroke them, press them, burn them up and along Mello's sides; drag him closer, closer.

Mello can't speak, but Matt hears him anyway.


End file.
